"But what is it, then, that fills me with joy when I am alone with myself? I rejoice in myself, in the entire universe, in all that is and that can be, in all that is beautiful in the world of the senses, the world of the imagination, and the world of the mind."
-Rousseau in a letter to Malesherbes from Montmorency in 1762

Never in a Monarchy can the opulence of an individual put him above the Prince; but, in a Republic, it can easily put him above the laws. Then the government no longer has force, and the rich are always the true sovereign.
~Rousseau (Lettre à d'Alembert)